A Glimpse at my Emotions

Sage Advice

2017-10-18, 11:00 PM

You probably wouldn't believe me if I said that yesterday, after my leave from my China Geography midterm (15 minutes before time's up, really), I came across one of my old professors from the "olden days" and picked up a chat with him.

Nope, it happened. And I may not remember exactly how our conversation went, but I do remember what he said to me.

I was just heading back to my residence after my very first midterm of the term, heading down the stairs to the Engineering court which is on my way to my residence, and coming along the path was my professor for Fluvial Geomorphology (the study of rivers) from two years ago.

At first, I thought he was my English Critical Analysis teacher. They looked very similar, actually--both had glasses, a wizened smart expression, and grey hair frizzing near the ends. But a closer look told me that this was not who I thought it was. And I had no idea if he would still remember me.

So I addressed him first as I reached the bottom of the stairs. "Professor Stone?" I said.

He turned to me then and a smile broke out over his face. "Ah, hello. It's nice to see you," he said tentatively.

Of course, he would. It had been two years since we last saw each other, and even he might not have remembered me from his Fluvial Geomorphology class at all. I barely did much in the class, though I did talk to him once or twice because of completely unrelated things. "It's nice to see you too," I responded lightly with a nod. "I was in your Fluvial Geomorphology class two years ago."

"Mhmm. Well, not many students actually come to visit me in my office as of late," Professor Stone told me. "How is your year going so far?"

"It's going well," I said with a nod without even thinking. "There are a few things that have proven to be quite challenging, but I can manage."

Now that's what I would call a practical default answer. I've said this a lot, actually. Of course, when it came to talking about academics, especially as of late, my mind automatically shuts down the truth and the only thing that comes out of my mouth is a lie. Only I wasn't sure whether this was a lie, as I actually have been doing a lot better than I had in the past--especially when we get to what happened last winter. Now that was a disaster.

"And what would you say was the challenge?" he asked me.

"I've been having some trouble working around prioritizing tasks," I admitted. And that was true; I haven't had a lot of sleep nor time to finish assignments. With all that had happened, I found it hard to wrap my mind around keeping this schedule so I could balance myself.

"What about work?"

"I work on Saturdays at a private elementary school, teaching children English for an hour and a half."

"Is that all you do in terms of jobs?"

"Yes."

"Then think of it this way. Think of your university life as a work week. You've got classes, and you've got projects, and you've got extracurricular activities. What if you mapped out the class times, and then work your schedule around when you do what assignment? You'd be able to leave out some time to hang out with friends on a Friday evening, do what you need to do."

This was new for me. I never thought of school like work, not at all. For all the years I actually sat in an office working my butt off for an organization I was doing co-op for, I never made that link.

"Thinking of that would help you engage a lot more with your schoolwork," he continued. "You begin to think a lot more critically, and you'll see the world in a different light. And it's like that for every university student--just by skimming the notes, you could only grasp something so basic. Basic only works for first years, and as you grow older, you need to grasp more or else you'll slip behind."

Right now, I can only remember so much of what he said, mostly because as I'm typing this I'm working on my lab and updating something on Instagram (yes, I'm making a third Instagram account, don't kill me). But he eventually went into something about an experiment in three groups--one with pencil and paper, one with a computer, and one with a computer and cell phone. He asked me which group would be more successful.

"The group with pencil and paper," I responded.

"Exactly. By writing them down, you are actively remembering something from the lecture, so that when you go back and compare your notes to what was on the slides, you make the connections, and you have these 'aha' moments that click," he said. "Whereas if you use a laptop, you're only passively writing the notes and you'd never think about them again after the lecture."

Of course, he didn't go into further detail about the group with the computer and the phone. Evidently, they would have done the worst out of everyone.

And he also mentioned this: "One needs to understand everything about one course before thinking about the content of another course, and so it goes on in everyday life. I remember this one time I was talking about statistics in another geography course, and this girl asked, 'Why are we talking about statistics?' And I responded, 'Well, first of all, the statistics that you have learned was important for having to determine what the observations eventually interpret. Do you know what numbers are needed for the T-test?'

"'No.'

"'Well, what about the Z-test?'

"'I have no idea.'

"And so you see how important it is to understand the entirety of one subject, because you know it would be used in the next course. Or, take for example, imagine if you're learning medicine. You'll need to learn all of the parts of the human anatomy to properly use the applications of medicine. If you only take the stomach, for example, then..."

"You won't understand what everything else does," I interjected.

Professor Stone nodded. "Yes, exactly."

And so it went on for a bit, and in the end, he actually gave me some pretty sage advice. "We are here to help you succeed. Your success as a student is our success as professors. In the future, you'll be seen as a Waterloo graduate. You'll remember what we have done to help you along your path to greatness. You succeed, we succeed. You fail, we fail. Try going into the workplace with low scores..."

"It's not going to work that way." I knew how it felt to show my parents low grades on my transcript. Honestly now that I remember it, I felt really guilty.

"So try to make use of us while you can. We are here to help you succeed. It hurts me to see so many people failing, but in the end, they need to realize the responsibility they needed to take to succeed."

Maybe it didn't sound like advice to you, but to me, it eventually made me realize just how much responsibility I have as a student, and a friend, and a lot of other things to others that make me a useful person in society. It was inspiring to get to hear a professor say these things.

"Thank you so much, Professor. It was very inspiring," I told him with a smile, shaking his hand.

It turned out that he wasn't teaching this term, but I will have to take up on his offer to see him in his office some time soon to chat.

And now that I chatted with him, I remembered a lot about his class. He reminded me a lot about how he told a story with every concept he taught, and if one paid attention to the story, they would see the connections.

Honestly now that I think about it, maybe there is a lot more depth to his words than I initially perceived. And a lot of things just make more sense to me. Maybe it's about time I start opening my eyes up and grow up.

Maybe all I need is a little nudge to incorporate some sort of maturity in my thinking. After all, my future is literally not too far away...